Development of rural tourism in China: The tragedy of anti-commons

The development of rural tourism presents the complexity of the industry, environment, governance, and coordination structure. In tourism development, due to the high dispersion and fragmentation of property rights of the resource objects themselves, as well as the involvement of many “atomic” property rights and other stakeholders, coupled with the lack of strong organization and leadership, the full development and utilization of rich tourism resources in rural areas is becoming problematic. It is difficult to realize the “rental value” of tourism resources, which leads to the tragedy of anti-commons. Taking the case of China, this paper explores the occurrence of anti-commons tragedy in the development of rural tourism, identifies the problems caused by the tragic governance of the anti-commons in the current environmental development, and further examines the governance path of the anti-commons tragedy in the tourism sector. The purpose of the study is to optimize the development environment of rural tourism and build a healthy space suitable for industry, residence, and tourism.